Books-n-Kisses is pleased to welcome Robyn Carr to the blog for her first visit! We are chatting about her newest book Four Friends. You can learn more about Robyn on her website.
Q: This is a novel about relationships. Romantic relationships. Friendships. Relationships with family. Is it hard to write the ins and outs of important and sometimes painful relationships? How do you do it?
A: Oh, this is what I love. Frankly I have a harder time writing romance than women’s fiction like Four Friends. For whatever reason, I’m acutely aware of the complexities of relationships. Life can be so messy and grievous sometimes, but it doesn’t have to spell doom. I read a book many years ago about the study of happiness or the psychology of the optimal experience. The question that drove the study was something like this: What is it that makes a woman who has suffered a divorce unable to get off the couch for ten years yet a woman of the same age who has survived Auschwitz goes on to live a fulfilling and satisfying life? I know these people—they’re all over my life and their stories are told constantly. Some people collapse and some rise to the occasion. I love creating new characters who face complicated human problems and through diligence and struggle find a way to make their lives well worth living.
But do I get a stiff neck as I’m marching them through the minefields of their difficult situations? Absolutely. Do I get tears in my eyes as they grieve and struggle? Yes! I also get tears when they approach the resolution that makes their lives a positive force, a joy. Getting from sometimes monumental problems to realistic and intelligent solutions is the greatest fun in my life.
Q: It’s often said that choosing whom you’ll marry is the most important decision of your life. Do you believe that? Do you think your characters believe that?
A: Oh, this is tough. I think choosing who to marry is powerfully important, but I’ve seen many, many women redefine their goals, reinvent themselves after making the wrong decision or the wrong choice. People make mistakes every day of their lives. The goal isn’t to never choose wrong or never to make a mistake, the healthiest life goal is to learn from those mistakes and emerge stronger and better and wiser.
I married at the age of twenty. It turned out to be the right choice; that turned out to be a miracle. A gift. Certainly a twenty-year-old girl doesn’t know what she’s doing when choosing a husband. And my husband was no smarter! We were very lucky we could make that work. In every marriage on record there will come a time (if not many times!) when you’ll rethink that decision and ask yourself just what you were thinking! Sometimes, you’ll say, I was damn lucky. In some marriages the question will linger and refuse to go away and ultimately it can be time to admit it was all wrong and move on to form stronger and healthier relationships.
In Four Friends some of the characters must admit they had chosen wrong, some will be so grateful for their choice. All of them will emerge stronger and wiser. And happier.
Q: Of the four women in this novel, which is the most like you? And which of them would you most like to be real friends with?
A: I’m not like any of them! There are characteristics in each of them I admire, but that’s the beauty of being a storyteller. If I’m in an argument with my husband, we’ll stumble and fumble, say the dumbest things, the cruelest things, botch everything or even have a brilliant moment or two. But in a story, I have days to write the dialogue between characters and in the end they say things I wish I had been smart enough to say, intuitive enough to conclude. The characters are smarter and quicker than I am! And they live such great lives—turning their foibles into victories.
I loved Gerri’s righteous anger. I loved Andy’s openness and willingness to take a closer look at who she has been in relationships. I loved Sonja’s tireless quest to keep her life meaningful and her generous spirit. I loved BJ’s courage. I loved the honesty of the psychiatrist and the wisdom of Murial, Gerri’s mother-in-law.
But if I wrote a character who resembled me, she would be so much more flawed! So dull!
Q: Without giving anything away, we will say that infidelity is a topic that comes up in the book. What made you decide to include this? Is it because a lot of women deal with this?
A: Every woman will deal with it on some level! If it doesn’t happen to us it has happened to someone we know, often someone we only know about. We have very strong opinions about it—very strong! I’ve heard many women say, “I’d kill him.” Or, “That’s a deal breaker!” And yet the percentage of marriages in which this has been a problem at one time or another is huge. I went into this book asking, “What would this character do? Is this pathology an opportunity for this character? Or is it the straw that breaks the camel’s back? Are there components in this problem that can make them stronger as a couple or is it the end of the line, turning everything she believed into a lie?”
The devil is in the details. Not knowing how it would all turn out, my job was to explore the details of this particular challenge.
Q: These women seem like people you would know from work or your neighborhood. And it’s because they all have problems like the rest of us. And yet, you help them deal with these problems so the book still has a message of hope. Do you think that’s something most women can have in their lives—hope that they can deal with hard things?
A: Yes I do, but hope comes in all shapes and sizes, doesn’t it? Hope for one woman is getting to the bottom of the flaw in the marriage that predisposes the cheating, hope for another is understanding, with great disappointment, the marriage cannot work. Ultimately hope lies in knowing yourself, knowing your limits and potential, knowing what really drives you toward a fulfilling and satisfying life, knowing and believing in your personal values. In this game, everyone gets a life! Not just the boys or the kids or the boss! Everyone deserves quality of life; everyone deserves the chance to live a full, rewarding life. And that’s a very individual thing.
*****
Four Friends
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Gerri can’t decide what’s more devastating: learning her rock-solid marriage has big cracks, or the anger she feels as she tries to repair the damage. Always the anchor for friends and her three angst-ridden teenagers, it’s time to look carefully at herself. The journey for Gerri and her family is more than revealin—it’s transforming.
Andy doesn’t have a great track record with men, and she’s come to believe that for her a lasting love is out of reach. When she finds herself attracted to her down-to-earth, ordinary contractor—a man without any of the qualities that usually appeal to her—she questions everything she thought she wanted in life.
Sonja’s lifelong pursuit of balance is shattered when her husband declares he’s through with her New Age nonsense and walks out. There’s no herbal tonic or cleansing ritual that can restore her serenity—or her sanity.
Miraculously, it’s BJ, the reserved newcomer to Mill Valley, who steps into their circle and changes everything. The woman with dark secrets opens up to her neighbors, and together they get each other back on track, stronger as individuals and unfaltering as friends.
Don’t miss Kimberly’s review of Four Friends HERE
Christine Finlayson borrowed from her “past lives” as a waitress, barista, environmental educator, and water scientist when creating her debut mystery novel, Tip of a Bone—a tale that takes place on the stormy Oregon coast. In her spare time, Christine loves to run on forest trails, watch waves break, compete in triathlons, and photograph anything Northwest-weird or wild. She’s now working on her second book, a novel of suspense.
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